Meeting in the tenth server
by Naoki Ichigo
Summary: Su Muqiu is the star of team Excellent Era, secretly helping out their guild Excellent Dynasty. The rumors about a player named Lord Grim had reached his ears, but only after watching his sister a little bit, Muqiu decide to take a closer look himself. Thereby he also meets an old friend. A lot of stress, because why going the easy way, when there was a hard one?
1. Part 1

The constant tapping on a keyboard and the clicking sound of a mouse sounded louder than it should be in the almost empty room. Besides himself no one else was here – here meant the trainings room of the Esports team Excellent Era. At the moment it was summer break, so most of the professional gamers, his teammates, had left and tried to relax a bit with their families at home. For him, the club building was his home. His parents were dead and back then he barely had the money to pay rent for a flat, so when he became a part of Excellent Era he decided to live there, since it was more convenient for him and his job as pro player and it meant less expenses. Why wasting money to rent something, when he also could stay at the club, where he hadn't had to pay or care for anything, well besides things like clothing or toiletries? Also living in the club building made it easier for him to play Glory – the game, which caused the Professional Alliance to be created in the first place. Su Muqiu was the star of Team Excellent Era. He was considered to be the best among all the pro players – even the best among the so called god level players. Even when he lost a match, everyone knew that no one could compare to him. His knowledge of the game itself was astonishing and something remarkable. Adding to this he also was the player with the most titles and awards – no one doubted that Muqiu would go down in Glory's history. The life as professional gamer was quite short, especially for those of the first generation. When the Alliance had been created a player had to be at least eighteen years old and with twenty-five a player was already considered old – too old. Of course, there were chances that a team would keep their player, even when he was older than twenty-five, as long as the player did not drag down the team or no better suited player was insight. Players of the first generation hadn't switched their teams – if they left the team than simple because they decided to retire. This was also Su Muqiu's plan. Team Excellent Era was his home, was his team and to say it in a melodramatic way, they were his family. Despite their current winning, pardon, losing record, Muqiu had not even once thought to leave the team. There were many other teams out there that wanted him, but until now he always had refused and he would do so in the future as well.  
During the summer break there also were many transfers, so Muqiu had to deal with all the invitations from other clubs, although the team had made a statement at the last press conference that Su Muqiu would stay the captain of the team. And if he still was the captain then how could his contract not be extended? How could he suddenly leave the team for a different club? But strangely no one seemed to care. Even the media was still guessing whether he was transferring this year or not – somehow everyone had forgotten about the press conference. Or they acted like this to make things appear more interesting than it actually was? Or they hoped for him to transfer, so they could make a big deal out of it – well, it would be a big deal anyway, but with Excellent Era first stating that he would stay and him leaving then, would be even bigger! Honestly, he did not look for this kind of gossip, but it was hard to ignore. Differently than most other pro players, he often spent his free time with playing in the normal servers. He had at least one account for every server, except for the newest, the tenth server. He was too busy with his other characters and helping his team's guild Excellent Dynasty that he had not made another account for the tenth server and he was not in a hurry to do so. For the guilds it was important to gain as many achievements as possible, like the first kill of hidden bosses or dungeon records, but for him in his free time he did not care much about such things. Excellent Dynasty had enough experts to ensure a lot of achievements and therewith rare materials.  
His sister Mucheng, on the other hand, had made herself an account on the tenth server and she seemed to enjoy it every much – thanks to her the guild gained many rare materials and was on the top of the leaderboard. She was also the one, who urged him to come to the tenth server, because there was a very talented player. Muqiu was indeed curious about said player, but robbing in talents was the duty of the guild and not his. Now that he had more free time due to the break he could pay a visit to the new server and take a look at the player his sister talked so much about. To be honest, Muqiu was a bit jealous that his sister praised another man so much. They were surrounded by young, talented and good-looking men, like Zhou Zekai, but she had never made such a fuss about any of them. His brother instinct immediately assumed that Mucheng may be interested in the other player, despite not knowing him. If this was like in her dramas than the other one should be either a very handsome and intelligent young man – probably with a dramatic background and rich parents – or the other one was a pervert, a psychopath that tried to lure innocent young girls into his house and then do something horrible to them – but before that could happen the hero, in this case Muqiu would play the role of the hero, would save the girl. If he had to choose between those two options, Muqiu obviously would choose the first one. His sister deserved a nice relationship, although the thought of it made him a bit sad, since this would mean less time for them together, but they both were grown-ups and had to go their own ways.

When Mucheng entered the room, Muqiu had just finished a dungeon in the eighth server. Although all of his characters were already in the Heavenly Domain, he preferred to play them in the normal server. Maybe it was a bit mean towards the normal players, when a pro gamer like him entered the field, but it wasn't like he did such things on a daily basis and there were many dungeons that waited to be conquered, many bosses to be stolen and even more records to be set. There was always something that could be achieved. Also despite a pro player being very skilled and normally were better at tactics than the normal players, they all barely had any experiences in large scale wars like the ones that always happened whenever a wild boss appeared. In the professional scene the fights were limited to either one versus one or five versus five. Hundreds versus hundreds were not a thing. However, Muqiu was different, because he often participated in such wars to help his guild, still he always listen to the guild leader in their instructions – of course, he sometimes would state his opinion about how to proceed, but most of the time he just followed the orders. The guild leader knew, who he was, but most of them knew Muqiu for quite some time and therefore didn't act like some stupid fanboys around him – besides the guild leaders no one in the guild knew about his activities in the game. It was better that way. First of all, he didn't want to deal with all his fans that would spam him with messages. Secondly he didn't want anyone to interrupt his free time. He only wanted to have some fun. Although he like fighting against others, competing with other, he also sometimes just wanted to have fun. Run around in Glory, kill monsters, create some Silver Weapons and try out new moves. Doing these kind of things made him remember the time before the professional scene was created. During this time he used gaming as a way to make money for himself and his little sister – quite funny that now he was still doing it, but as an accepted job.  
Su Mucheng sat down next to her brother and started the computer. While it started she took a look at her brother's screen.  
"Another record?", she asked in a tone that made her question sound more like a statement than a question.  
"Yes, but I think, I could beat it again, if we have the right people to come along", he replayed honestly and then logged out of his eighth server account.  
"Are those right people other pro players? I doubt that besides you and me anyone else would be willing to "waste" their free time with playing around in the normal servers for some dungeon records."  
A sad truth.  
"Yeah, you're right. But this doesn't change the fact that it would be possible to break this record. Nevertheless, you're helping out in the tenth server again? Or are you just playing around with your new friend?", Muqiu honestly curious asked, while taking a look at his sisters screen, which now showed her tenth server avatar "Cleansing Mist".  
She played a Luncher, which looked a lot like Dancing Rain – her character in the professional league. At first he had been a bit worried that people might discover her, but until now nothing like this had happened. Maybe the other gamers thought she was just a big fan of Su Mucheng and Dancing Rain and therefore decided to choose the same class, a similar name and a similar appearance – it was nothing unusual for fans to try to imitate their idols.  
"Oh, I left the guild three days ago and no one knew it was me anyway", Mucheng answered nonchalant with a smile.  
For a few seconds Muqiu was startled. She had left the guild? Why?  
"Why?", he asked.  
"Because it would be a problem, when I hang out with Lord Grim and be a part of the guild. Somehow the guild was able to stir up some trouble with Lord Grim. So I think it might be better to choose one side."  
Sounded reasonable, but then she should have chosen Excellent Dynasty and not that Lord Grim dude.  
"But some people will still know that you, that "Cleansing Mist", once was a part of the guild."  
"But I was with Lord Grim first."  
"So, the guild tried to rob the two of you in?"  
It wasn't surprising. One duty of the guild was it to find new talents and get them to join the guild and hopefully, when they skill level was good enough, the pro team. Mucheng was already a pro player, but this was something the guild didn't know in this case, so trying to rob her in, was a normal behavior of them.  
"No, they tried to rob Lord Grim in and thought he would join, if I did. But this did not happen, so I think they do not care much about me leaving. You shouldn't worry too much."  
Muqiu really wasn't sure what to think about this Lord Grim person. Most players would feel honored to be asked by the guilds to join them, because this meant that they skills were recognized and there was a chance for them to join the pro league. Of course, there also were those kind of players that only played for fun and had no interest in the pro scene. However, most of those players often did not have enough skills to join anyway or were barely recognized since they did not play for long. But how those the saying go: "The exception proves the rule."  
This Lord Grim seemed to be the exception.

"How did the guild get into trouble with Lord Grim?", Muqiu asked after a while of silence and watching Mucheng clearing a dungeon with Lord Grim and a group of other players.  
"I'm not so sure. Maybe they are angry, because he helped some of the other guilds to get dungeon records and first kills?"  
Mucheng did not pay much attention to her brother and his question, because she had to focus on the dungeon. Luckily Muqiu stop asking further and decided to look through the Glory forum to find some information on Lord Grim. He had done so before, but since now and then some time had passed and a lot could have happened. Maybe he could find out what happened between Lord Grim and the different guilds. It would be a shame, if this player decided not to join Excellent Era or their guild, because of something small like a few records and first kills – Mucheng said that the player of Lord Grim was quite talented, so Muqiu believed her. As pro player it was easier to judge the skills of other players, so if one of them acknowledged someone and their skills this was not meant to please someone, but because it was true. However, just because she praised his skills did not mean that he was also good enough for the pro scene, whether this was the case, had to be decided not only through the skill level of someone. Being a pro player was a hard job – even when most people thought it was easy to play games all day, this was not true at all.  
When he had first searched for some information on Lord Grim, there only was a bunch of people – or better said one person and stirred everyone else up – that accused Lord Grim of tricking his teammates by not healing them and then stealing a hidden boss. Also he had seen some post about the three big guilds that used Lord Grim's help to set records. Never had he seen any posts about Excellent Dynasty being involved in any of that. Of course, they would be affected by such a behaviors, because this meant losing rare material and dungeon records were important to show off to the other gamers.  
Now that he was searching he could find a lot more. Seemingly some players had reported Lord Grim to the Alliance, because they thought he cheated. A reasonable thought considering that the weapon of that person was quite unique. From the posts on the forums Muqiu found out that the weapon could change its form – so it was safe to assume that it was a silver weapon, which was quite impressive to be in the possession of a normal player. Lord Grim was a so called unspecialized character with a unique silver weapon called the "Myriad Manifestation Umbrella". Very eye-catching. No wonder all the guilds were after him. Maybe it was finally time to pay a visit to the tenth server – and maybe he should have a talk with Chen Yehui, who was the guild leader of the tenth server, to get some information about the current situation of the server and the relationship between Lord Grim and Excellent Dynasty. Maybe there was still a chance for them to rob this player in!  
After his little search was done he watched his sister playing with her new friends. Besides Lord Grim there were four other players that helped to set a new dungeon record and from the way their coordinated with each other, it seemed that they were no strangers to each other. One of those four was Mucheng and her Luncher, than there was a Battle Mage called Soft Mist – despite that name she was far away from being soft –, a Brawler named Steamed Bun Invasion – what a name – and a Ghostblade with the Name of One Inch Ash. The Battle Mage and the Brawler seemed to be new to the game, since they often made beginner mistakes. However, many of their mistakes seemed to be covered by their fast movements, which led to the assumption that those two had a very high hand speed. One Inch Ash was nothing remarkable. He had a consistent performance and was quick with his decision making – probably an experienced player. As pro player one did not only need a high hand speed, one also needed to be able to make quick decisions and grabs the situation on the battlefield. Mucheng for example was nothing outstanding in the pro scene. Her hand speed was mediocre, but she was a great support. She knew very well, when she had to act, when to stay behind and when to use which skill. Her ability to observe and judge the situation in front of her were great. This also seemed to be the case for this One Inch Ash. However, Muqiu didn't want to come to a conclusion too fast. Maybe that person was just lucky and the other twos unlucky. Most of his attention was drawn in by Lord Grim anyway.  
Many years ago Muqiu had also dreamed of a strong and outstanding unspecialized character. In the first years of Glory this character type was not seldom, because they had a hug advantage over the other classes. As unspecialized one could learn skills from every class – only low level skills, but when used right even those could be very powerful. The downside of this class was the fact that one needed to always have the right weapon with them to be able to use most of those low level skills. A lot of weapon meant a lot of weight and a lot of weight meant less speed. Also changing weapons during a fight, especially a PvP – Player versus Player – was more than impractical and could cost one the victory – so most of the unspecialized players back then always played in a preferred class anyway. Things got even worse when the so called Heavenly Domain and a "Class Awaking Quest" were established. Furthermore the level a character could have was raised up. Therewith playing an unspecialized was extremely disadvantage in the later stages of the game, thus became unattractive to almost every normal player. Muqiu had tried to find a way to solve the problem with the weapons, but after all these updates he gave up and put his energy into something else. Remembering his own unspecialized character made him feel a bit sad and nostalgic. Maybe he should pull that old character out of his drawer and start over again – where exactly had he put that card? Lord Grim's player had been able to solve this problem to some extent.  
"Do you know how many forms the weapon of Lord Grim has?", Muqiu asked his sister, who had finished the dungeon with her group and leant back in her chair.  
"I don't know. So far I've seen three of them", Mucheng honestly answered and switched her attention back to the game.  
Someone had written something in the group chat. Although it was definitely not proper to read someone else's messages, Muqiu did exactly that and he wasn't subtle about it. So, in case his sister wouldn't like him to read the messages, she could stop him. Lord Grim was giving advice to his teammates, so it was mostly him writing. In the end the group decided to go into the dungeon again and try to improve – try to not make the same mistakes again. The second tour took longer, because everyone had slowed down to pay more attention to themselves and their teammates. A third round followed, in which everyone speeded up again – they did not make as many mistakes as in their first round. This was quite impressive, although a lot of the mistakes of the first round were probably done, because the player didn't pay enough attention to everything around. Now that they paid more attention to their surrounding – kept in mind that there was a surrounding, which could be interacted with – things were a bit better, but there was still a lot of room to develop.

Without saying a word Muqiu left the trainings room and went to the guild's department. If he wanted information on Lord Grim it was probably the best to ask Mucheng, but she didn't seem to be ready to tell him much – or she really didn't know much about the other player. When he had asked her, about the other members of the group, she also didn't say much. Soft Mist and Steamed Bun Invasion were indeed only beginners, who had never played Glory before – but their skills were impressive – while she knew absolutely nothing about the player of One Inch Ash. He had joint them not so long ago and seemed to know Lord Grim. However, he never really introduced himself – something no one had really done. They knew each other's in-game names and that's it. From the way Soft Mist, Steamed Bun Invasion and Lord Grim interacted with each other, Muqiu assumed that those three knew each other better, an assumption Mucheng had confirmed, when he had asked. Those two questions were all she had answered – and the only two he had asked her, while reading the chat messages and watching her clearing the dungeon. Mucheng had a look in the inside of Lord Grim's group and a different perspective on his actions and motivations, now it was time to listen to Chen Yehui and find out what that unspecialized had done to the guild and how the interaction between those two had went so far.  
The room for the guild members were very spacious and friendly. Only guild members that were employed by the club would come here to play. Chen Yehui was one of those members. He had started as a trainee in Team Excellent Era's trainings camp and ended up as guild leader of Excellent Dynasty, since he was not good enough to be a pro player, however he had the right skills to be a guild leader. Such a position was nothing to look down upon. The guild was extremely important to the club, because the materials for the silver equipment was from the normal servers and those who got them were the players there. Consequently, it was the guild members that got all the wanted and needed materials for the club. Also the guilds were a way to advertise their respective clubs and find new talents. Without the guild and its members a pro team would have it hard – thing would surely be very different. When he entered the room, he greeted everyone and then went straight to Chen Yehui's computer – or the one the guild leader mostly used. Fortunately, he found the other one there. He was sitting in front of his computer and scrolling through the guild leader's group chat. Muqiu didn't want to be as intrusive as he had been with his sister. She would simply push him back, but wouldn't be mad at him. However, Chen Yehui wouldn't take it as lightly as Mucheng would. Moreover, Muqiu knew that the other one disliked him a lot, although he couldn't think of a reason for this dislike.  
"Good morning", Muqiu greeted with a friendly smile.  
Slowly Yehui moved his head from the computer to Muqiu. His expression was everything but friendly.  
"I will make it short. I need a card for the tenth server, because I want to take a look at that Lord Grim guy."  
When he mentioned Lord Grim, Chen Yehui's expression darken even more. Seemingly the guild leader did not like Lord Grim.  
After a few moments of silence, Yehui got up from his chair and went to a drawer.  
"What class?", he simply asked.  
He sounded sleepy. Had he worked all night? Or didn't sleep well?  
"A would like to decided that later. Do you have a blank card?"  
With a blank card, Muqiu meant a card without equipment or a class. Normally the guilds had a lot of account cards, but most of them were already used and had a set class and equipment. However, for his plan Muqiu needed or wanted to have character that he could form to his will – and one that wasn't in any guild.  
When he said he wanted a blank hard, he got a blank stare form Yehui first, but in the end he got what he wanted.  
"Lord Grim may be prejudiced towards me, when I would be a part of Excellent Dynasty", Muqiu explained himself.  
"Can you give him some information on him and his group? I need to be prepared, when I meet him or want to gossip about him with other players."  
Silently Chen Yehui returned to his seat and started to scroll through the guild leader group chat again – this time in the opposite direction, instead of downwards he scrolled upwards.  
"Most of my information are second hand. Excellent Dynasty hadn't had much to do with him until now. It was Blue Brook, who made the first move and tried to rob him in. He helped them to set a record, but left soon after this was accomplished. He did the same for Tyrannical Ambition. As payment he takes rare materials – a lot of rare materials. Herb Garden hasn't made a move on him – at least they never had worked together. But that doesn't mean that they are not interested in him – or they know something about him, no one else knows. I have no information about the smaller guilds, but I am sure that, if Lord Grim had worked with them, it would have been known by us already. Also smaller guild probably cannot pay him the right amount of rare materials", Chen Yehui explained.  
In the group chat he had stopped at the part, in which some of the guild leaders were laughing about Blue Brook and Tyrannical Ambition for paying Lord Grim so much materials for nothing. The conversation went back and forth and Muqiu had to admit that they sounded like a bunch of preschoolers.  
"So, there is no bad blood between Lord Grim and Excellent Dynasty?"  
When asked this question, Yehui didn't dare to look into Muqiu's eyes. It was hard to answer with yes or no. A "I am not sure" was probably the right answer, but he didn't want to give such an answer.  
"Well, one of our members stole a strategy from him and set a dungeon record with it", he admitted.  
He didn't mention the fact that said member was also a member of the main roster of the pro team. Liu Hao and Chen Yehui got along very well, but this was not because of their oh so deep friendship, no it was simply because they both disliked Muqiu a lot. Hate could connect people.  
"Lord Grim set a new record, which was then topped by said player again. Since said player used characters from Excellent Dynasty the record was set our under name, but I am sure that the player did not use his guild tag or revealed himself as a member of Excellent Dynasty, when spying on Lord Grim, so I think that Lord Grim does not know, who the other one was. Consequently, there shouldn't be a reason for him to be hostile towards us. However, I cannot guarantee it. Besides that record thing, nothing negative happened between us. It is just extremely annoying and bothersome that he helps the other guilds with setting records."  
Records were important to draw people towards a guild and hopefully those people would also become fans of the clubs. Every server had new players that weren't interested in the pro scene and therefore would not join a guild right away. A fan of Excellent Era would immediately join the in-game guild and not care about other guilds, while some, who weren't a fan of any guild wouldn't join from the start. Such people, in case they knew what advantages a guild had for a player, would join a guild that suited their taste or had most of their friends. And then there were those, who had no idea and either join a guild randomly, because they liked the name or because they felt like they had to do so. Of course, some would never join a guild at all, but those were often players that didn't care much about the game and only played it a few times. Those, who would chose a guild by its name, would also often choose a guild that had a lot of positive accomplishments. So, whenever a record was set, the system announced it for everyone to see and hear – also records could be always looked up. However, if someone took a close look, than one should see that those records were made under the name of the guilds, but all teams had Lord Grim as member. It was only possible for a player to be in one guild at a time. Switching guilds was possible, but there was blockage of a few days until a person, after leaving a guild, could join another one. In the end this method wasn't every efficient for Lord Grim and it could give the guild a bad name.  
"What about the other members of his group?"  
"Um, I heard from the other guild leaders that the Brawler is a total idiot. He and Lord Grim met, during a fight for a wild boss – well, fight may be big of a word. The other guild never had a change to even touch the wild boss, before it had been defeated by Lord Grim. The Battle Mage, on the other hand, is good, her fighting style it quite aggressive. But I think she is new to Glory, because she makes so many beginner mistakes. However, I think she and Lord Grim know each other personally. When she entered the game she more or less immediately went up to Lord Grim and since then those two are often seen together. The Ghostblade joint a few weeks ago, but barely shows up with the group – I guess, he had spent most of his time with leveling up. So we might see him more often from now on. Similar to the Battle Mage, Soft Mist, he straight up went to Lord Grim. So maybe those two also know each other outside of the game", Chen Yehui said, trying to sound as nonchalance as possible.  
While he spoke he scrolled through the chat again, only this time he wasn't sure whether he should scroll upwards or downwards. Muqiu couldn't help him therewith, since he didn't know what the other one was searching for.  
"So, besides Lord Grim, there are three more in his group?"  
"Um, there also is a female Luncher. We were able to rob her in and hoped that Lord Grim would follow, but in the end he never came and the Luncher left the guild three days ago. Her skills a good, but nothing too outstanding. However, she and Lord Grim coordinate well with each other. This is a real problem, when fighting for bosses."  
"How have you tried to rob him in?"  
Slowly Yehui closed the chat group and went to the game itself. There he opened a chat between him and Lord Grim. Without a word he moved aside, so Muqiu could take a better look at the conversation.  
Like the other guild he had tried to get Lord Grim by offering rare materials. However, apparently the other one already had a fixed list, which he had sent to Yehui. Upon seeing said list Muqiu was completely speechless. The items were hard to get, but for a guild it was easier than for a normal player. Only one item belong to a wild boss, which was quite hard to get. First of all the guild needed to get the boss and kill it, before someone else could do so, and secondly the wild boss must drop the needed item. If Lord Grim sent this list to all guild leaders, who wanted his help, the chances for him to get them was quite high. Even when Excellent Dynasty didn't have the wanted rare materials or wasn't able to get the boss, which had the item, another guild may have it. This was a shameless, but brilliant plan!  
Muqiu started to wonder that Lord Grim's player was after. If he wanted to compete with others in-game, it was clear that this wasn't possible soon anymore, because with his silver weapon he already was stronger than most of the other players. Or did that person only want to complete his silver weapon. But what then? Stop playing Glory? Why had the started to play the game to begin with, if he stops as soon as his weapon was finished? Was Lord Grim a pro player that was on a secret mission? Maybe another team wanted to create a secret weapon and Lord Grim was the test version? Muqiu doubted himself, but this was an option. Most pro team already had a fixed style and barely any team would risk a complete make-over – not that it was impossible or never done before, but it was extremely rare. So, maybe Lord Grim belong to a future team? Every season there were two teams from the Alliance that got relegated. For those two teams, there were two new ones. One team would be enter through some kind of selection procedure and the second team would come from the Challenger League.  
"Do you know, if Lord Grim is already in a team? One that will be part of the Alliance starting next season?", Muqiu asked.  
"No. He does not have any guild tag and he also does not seem to be interested in the Pro League. I once told him that he might have the skills for a professional career. He only thanked me and that's it. If he is part of the Challenger League, I cannot say much. The registration hasn't opened yet."  
Player, who were in a guild, could hid their guild tag, but Lord Grim was switching between the guilds, when they hired him, so it was hard to say whether he had a guild, which he was loyal to – or maybe even worked for –, or not. If he was part of a newly founded team than the guild of said team was probably small and did not have many materials, thus could not make any or at least many silver weapons – in the professional alliance it was normal to have silver weapons for every character. Consequently Lord Grim could be a part of a smaller guild and was collecting rare materials for them. This was still a shameless, but brilliant plan!  
"Um… alright", Muqiu said without looking at Yehui and moved away from the computer screen.  
Slowly he got up from his chair, put the card in his pocket and moved towards the door.  
Before he left and turned around and said to Yehui: "I will message you as soon as I've created my character. However, it might be the best, when no one knows that the two of us know each other."  
He was sure, Chen Yehui would understand that this meant that he was not going to help the guild, even worse may have to work against it. Not a nice thought. What should a bunch of normal players do against a god-like player? There was a reason, why Muqiu was called a god. A very good reason! When the door fall shot, Yehui sighed. Lord Grim was enough stress, now he also had to deal with Muqiu in the game. He appreciated the help of the other male in every other server and he had hoped that Muqiu would finally come to the tenth server to help out against Lord Grim – Yehui didn't like Lord Grim and his player, therefore he had not tried too much or for too long to rob the other one in –, but now he might have to fight against Lord Grim and Muqiu. The other three of the Lord Grim group were strong as well, maybe not as good as their leader, but definitely better than any other normal player and with a little bit more experience they may surpass some of Excellent Dynasty's long term experts. However, this was a thought Chen Yehui refused to think and successfully kept out of his mind. For him the others were just a bunch of beginners and would not come far without Lord Grim, therefore he focused the mostly on this player. The other guilds also didn't seem to be interested in the rest of the group.

Mucheng was still playing the game, when Muqiu reentered the trainings room. Instead of sitting down next to her, he chose a computer further away. He had decided that he did not want her to know that he now also played in the tenth server – although she would probably discover him as soon as he started to interact with Lord Grim. If she wouldn't be able to do so, he would be very disappointed with her. However, he feared that if he tells her right away, she might act suspicious and make Lord Grim warry of him. Before he sat down on his new place he watched Mucheng playing a bit. He couldn't say whether she was in a dungeon again or simply leveling outside – he could say for sure that she wasn't in the arena and that she was still with Lord Grim. He must be a very nice play partner. A bit of jealousy rose inside of Muqiu. Until now Mucheng never went to the game and helped him with helping the guild, but suddenly when the tenth server opened she was one of the first to make a new account – he hereby ignored all the guild members that got a new account the very second the new server opened – and now she was having fun with some random dude. Wait! Did this mean those two already knew each other? She hadn't been interested in all the other servers, so why the tenth? The only logical possibility was that she and Lord Grim already knew each other and when she probably heard that he was in the tenth server decided to also go there! But when did they met? Maybe during one of her jobs? Differently than him, Mucheng often participated in advertisements or interviews, so she also met a lot of different people – some of them were interested in gaming, others were not. On the other hand, just meeting once wouldn't make her run to the new server like that, right? Even if the other one was a fan of hers or of Glory, there was no reason to meet him in the game. Did they meet each other a long time ago and he hadn't realized that his sister had a friend? He knew her Glory friends, but outside of the scene he knew no one, in case she even had friends outside of Glory. Strange. Very strange! He didn't like it. But instead of saying anything or asking her, Muqiu focused on his plan. Since he had asked for a blank card, he had to choose a class and a name for his avatar himself. Sounded easier than it actually was. Until now he either had his sister, who named his avatars, or the guild provided him with a class and name. Choosing a class, wasn't much of a problem, since he was fine with every available class. However decided a name was quite hard for him. He wanted a name, that wouldn't stand out, but also shouldn't be forgotten the every second someone switched his attention away from him. Of course, whether one remembered another player was not always – well, most of the time actually – because of the name, but because of the skills. If he wanted a name that wouldn't stand out, he could simply look through the forums and see what kind of names were used by others. It took him a little bit longer than an hour to decide for a name and a class. He was extremely proud of himself, when he finally confirmed his name and class. Shortly after his confirmation, he found himself in a city inside of the game. Said city was called the "Beginner Village".

When a server was newly opened the Beginner Village was filled with so many new players that it was almost impossible to move around, so one could say it was better to start later than the majority of the players. A quest that may only take a few hours could take twice as much. The problem wasn't the quest itself, it was the time one waste waiting to receive the quest. Luckily, Muqiu didn't have to wait long for his quests. After he finished them, he looked out for Chen Yehui's avatar and for information on Lord Grim. Logically the other one was already at a higher level and therefore wouldn't waste his time with the low level areas, which Muqiu had to use for now, since he wasn't strong enough. For now, all he could do was to gather information through other players and observe the movements of Lord Grim – which was mostly done by the guild, since Muqiu could not directly interact with Lord Grim, if the other one was in areas with a higher level and no, Muqiu had no intention of randomly writing Lord Grim. Last but not least he also could ask Mucheng about Lord Grim's movements or watch her playing with the other one. It wouldn't be suspicious for an older brother to be interested in his younger sister's in-game activities, right? He only was expressing interest in her and her life. There was nothing wrong or strange about that! In the past he had often asked her questions about her day and this would be the same now, just that he would asked about her day inside the game. Mucheng was used to his passion – obsession – with Glory, so she wouldn't think of it as strange or mind it. They often talked about Glory.

After finishing the beginner quests and contacting Yehui, Muqiu wanted to level up a bit, since he wanted to catch up to Lord Grim as soon as possible. So while he made his way to the leveling area, he moved slowly, because he also wanted to hear what other players around him had to say. Maybe they talked about Lord Grim. Thanks to the voice chat option, one only had to be close enough to another player to hear their conversation. Unfortunately, only one person talked about Lord Grim. It was a Blade Master, who acted as if he was the greatest expert in the history of Glory and said he would be friends with Lord Grim. When Muqiu asked him, why he wasn't with the latter one, the other one answered that he preferred to help the newcomers. While Muqiu's avatar didn't change his facial expression, Muqiu on the other hand raised his eyebrow upon hearing this. It wasn't like there weren't any players, good players, out there that really were so kind to help new players, but those were extremely rare and normally they wouldn't brag about it. Often those players also belonged to a big guild, which often caused the newcomers to also enter this guild. So helping out others was also a way to gain new follower for a guild. During the years before the professional league, Muqiu also had often helped new players. He wanted others to enjoy Glory as much as he did! To have fun, people needed to understand the game and have success. Always losing wasn't fun or needing weeks or months just to reach an acceptable level to get around in the game. Glory was a game that had a lot to offer and it would be sad, if someone never found out about all the possibilities this game had in store, just because the person was too frustrated or got bored.  
Mucheng had already left the trainings room. From the sound of it, she had been quite busy with fighting or did she and the rest of the group had such an interesting discussion that she had to write on Huang Shaotian level? He doubted this a lot. So, she was probably fighting against monsters all the time. Only towards the end she slowed down and seemed more relaxed, less focused. It was summer break so she didn't have to train the whole day and logically could do whatever she wanted with her day. Maybe she wanted to take a little stroll through the city. Some stores had sales. Hopefully she would find something nice for herself. Now that he thought about it, he should probably buy her something nice too. She always was so happy, when he bought her a gift – which happened relatively seldom. Not that he did not care about her or didn't want to make her a gift. It was more that he often forgot about this kind of things and a part of him always told himself to save their money. The years in poverty had marked him and he didn't want to go back to those days – he didn't view his past as bad or dark, since he focused more on the positive aspects instead of the negative ones. Mucheng was probably the same. At least she never complaint about their past, when they remembered those days. She also never demanded anything from him. Thinking about it, she was such a kindhearted and sweet little sister. In the end Muqiu felt bad for not informing her about his plans, but he had made his decision and wouldn't change it now. For the next few days he would be busy with leveling anyway and later, when he would met Lord Grim and the rest, Mucheng would identify him immediately. She knew his playstyle more than anyone else, even when he tried to hide, she would see through him. So, just because he did not tell her directly, didn't mean she wouldn't find out on her own – also it would be strange, if he started to avoid her in the trainings room, so she could see what he was playing. Theoretically, she would probably find out about his plans very soon, since they often sat next to each other when playing Glory – he could also tell her, because it was so useless to hide it, but a decision was a decision, even when it was a stupid and useless one.


	2. Part 2

The sun had already set, when Muqiu logged out of the game and returned to his room. It was a small room with a bed, a wardrobe and a desk. On his desk he had a computer, thus he could play Glory in his room. However, he was so used to go to the trainings room, that he almost every time forgot about his own computer. From his window he could only see the street in front of the club's building and the houses on the other side of the street. Fortunately his room was on a higher floor, so he hadn't had to fear people looking through the window. Fans could be very scary sometimes. Some pro players had shared some extremely worrisome and creepy stories with the rest. Muqiu was happy that his fans hadn't acted out like that until now and hope they never would do so. Maybe it was simply because he hadn't had that many fans? Since he did not care much about such things he didn't know if he was popular or not – on the other hand, since he was always invited to the All Star weekend, one could safely assume that he was indeed popular. Whether a pro player was invited to the All Star weekend depended on a vote set up by Alliance. The player with the most votes would get an invitation – Muqiu was at top of the votes. The only two people that had beaten him in the votes until now were Zhou Zekai and Mucheng, which wasn't surprising. Zhou Zekai was a talented player, however the majority of his fans were females that cared more about his good looks – Muqiu felt sorry for him. It was always sad, when the talent and achievements of someone was overlooked because of something trivial as appearance. The same was more or less the case of Mucheng. Many male player only voted for her, because she look so fine, while her female fans votes, because she was a girl – some kind of role model. Of course, not all fans were like that. Some also appreciated those two for their talent and achievements. And none of them had any reason to hide themselves. Zhou Zekai was already regarded a God and Mucheng had proven to be a valuable player for her team. Muqiu himself was also quite good looking, but since he barely appeared in public, most people barely remembered his face. The advantage was obvious, first of all he could walk down the streets without being surrounded by fans and secondly people only judged his play and not his looks. When fans would remember him, than it would be because of how good or bad he had played. The downside was probably that without the team's uniform the security in the stadiums thought he was a fan and not a player, thus tried to threw him out. It almost happened once. Thank Mucheng that she was nearby and could help him. Ever since than he made sure to never forget to wear his uniform – wasn't it sad that the person, who is considered the best player in the history of Glory, is not even recognized by the people that are supposed to protect him? Well, there was no reason to let his thought linger any longer on this accident, however there was a good reason to go to bed. A part of him was tiered, while the other part still wanted to do something. Unfortunately, this part didn't know exactly what this something was. He had played Glory the whole day, so he didn't want to play it now. Maybe he should go through his notes? Although the club had a department, which only existed to develop and research silver equipment, Muqiu still had his own notes and always added to them. When Glory first came out the equipment editor was his best friend, since everyone more or less wanted a self-made weapon, but there weren't many that were able to make them. It was a great way to make some money. How much time had he invested in researching different materials and how to put them together – how to make them into a great weapon? How much time had the player behind Lord Grim invested in researching for his silver weapon?  
There weren't that many dedicated players out there anymore. It was quite sad that nowadays a lot of players only started Glory because of their idols and not because of the game itself – of course some of them also started because they liked the game as such. Even sadder was the fact that many of the new pro players were only interested in fame and money – they were good at Glory and so they saw it as a way to get famous. Muqiu wasn't judging them, everyone had their reasons for doing what they were doing, but he wished things would be more like in the first years of the professional alliance. When the alliance was about the game and not about fame or money or being good-looking. Of course, in the end it were the skills that decided whether someone could stay in the pro scene or not, since no team wanted a player that only was nice to look at. However, fans were a bit different. This was partly because most could not judge the skills as deeply and precisely as the clubs and other pro players and partly because not every fan was there because of the game. It may sound strange to others that someone claimed to be a fan, but did not care much about the thing they are supposed to be fans of. How could one be a fan of Zhou Zekai, when one did not like gaming or did not care about Glory? Well, some could. The majority of the fans also played Glory and liked the game, but every scene had they black sheep – if one wanted to use such a term.  
After thinking about what to do next and because he didn't want to think about Glory anymore – yes, even someone as obsessed with the game as him sometimes needed a few Glory free moments and thoughts – he step outside his room again and went downstairs to the entrance. The club had a cafeteria, where the employees could eat either something they bought or what was offered from the kitchen stuff there. Muqiu liked to eat there, because it gave him the opportunity to talk to different people and therewith broaden his horizon. The trainees also ate there and always seemed happy, when he sat down with them. For tonight he decided to get something from the nearby McDonalds. Maybe he should get something for Mucheng as well? Where was she anyway? He hadn't looked for her, so maybe she was in her room. Or was she still outside? Had she even went outside? Whatever, if she wasn't hungry or stayed away for longer, he could eat her potion too and if she was in her room and hungry she could eat it herself.

The counter was quite empty. There was only one other person in front of him. Everyone else was already sitting at a table and eating – even the number of those people were quite small. Was it already that late? Or was it too early? Probably too late. Muqiu didn't have a watch – he had one on his phone, but he didn't count it – so he couldn't look up the time and in the end it did not matter. Fewer people meant less waiting for him. The person in front of him was a man with black hair and probably around Muqiu's age. Nothing remarkable. There were many people like this out there. The reason why Muqiu noted this man – payed more attention to him – was his hands. Whenever he met someone new, the first thing he look at was the hands of the other person. It was a habit Muqiu had ever since… Yeah, since when? He always had done so. Well-kept hands were not a necessity for becoming a pro gamer or a good gamer, but it was nothing unusual for pro players to look out for their hands – their hands were the most important part of their body for their job. How should they play without their hands or with injured hands? So the reasons why he noted hands of the other man were first of all, they were well-kept and secondly did not really fit the rest of the appearance of the man. How could such beautiful hands belong to a man that look more dead than alive? To someone that look as if he couldn't care less about appearance? Why should someone like this take care of his hands but not the rest of his body? Well, on the other hand, this was more or less the same for Muqiu. His hands received the most attention, while the rest was more or less ignored. Why should he care about how his face looked like or if he was overweight? The same couldn't be said about the other man. How could one call a face that looked paler than the moon – maybe the other one was sick – nice? It wasn't like the face of the other one was ugly, just a bit more sunlight and sleep, thus less all-nighters, may do some wonders – a regular sleep schedule was always a good option. The other man passed Muqiu without saying a word, neither did Muqiu.

In his room again Muqiu opened the page of the Glory forum. While reading the posts – he knew most of them already – he ate. The thought that the player behind Lord Grim may already be part of an official club was still lingering in his mind or that the other one would partake in the Challenger League. So Muqiu also checked out the other teams, especially the two knew teams from last year and the two, which should join the alliance this year. The two teams last year were nothing outstanding. One team was already disbanded again. They weren't too bad, but not good enough for the pro league. Only two players had the skills to be part of the league and those two left their original team and joint one of the bigger clubs. The other players were not good enough and therefore, after playing in the professional league for only one year, they had to leave. Of course, they could join the Challenger League this year and try their luck again, but this was a bit stupid. Even when they found some good players again, in the end it would turn out like it did at the end of this season. The second team wasn't bad either and was still operating. If they could maintain – improve themselves by every year – their current strength and performance, they might become one of the mediocre teams of the league. In the next season there would be one team called Heavenly Sword that was created by a rich kid. Many looked down upon such teams, but speaking logically and realistically being rich was more or less the only way to fulfill all the needed requirements to become a professional team. Which normal person was able to pay for a stadium? How many had enough many to buy or rent a club building and how many had the money to invest most of their time in playing games? Also when one finally was accepted by the alliance, one needed to win matches so one wasn't relegated at the end of the season. Therefore high-end equipment was needed, hence silver equipment was needed – such thing normally couldn't be bought, so one had to craft them oneself and this needed time and material. So, in the end it was easier for people with a lot of money to open a club and stay in the league than for someone, who had nothing. For those people did the Challenger League existed. The team that won the Challenger League would get support from the alliance to establish themselves – although until now the Challenger League was more a way for relegated clubs to get back into the Alliance. How should a team made up of normal players and without any silver equipment beat a former pro team?  
Teams from the Challenger League were hard to investigate, because those few that paid attention to this event were mostly fans of a relegated team, thus paid only attention to their team's machetes. The other matches were mostly ignored. Furthermore, the Challenger League was a "life and death" event. Losing meant being kicked out and since Glory was not a single-player game, having only one good player was not enough to make it to the end. From his quick search Muqiu found out that there was no player like Lord Grim in the last Challenger League – this finding was relative, because in case the player behind Lord Grim had used a different account and his teammates were bad, he may not have come far and there may have not been recognized – and from the few information he had on Heavenly Sword they also had no unspecialized character.  
When searching through the Glory forums Muqiu tried to find people that claimed to partake in the Challenger League. Although the registration hadn't started yet, it didn't mean that no one was talking about it – at least those who saw a chance for themselves there or wanted to have some fun. Sadly besides a few people claiming they would be in a team with Lord Grim, he couldn't find anything. That those posts were only jokes was plain obvious, especially when five different people made the same claim without any backup, just to tell others they should stop lying, because Lord Grim was with them. Never in his life before had Muqiu thought it would be that hard to get some information – hereby he completely ignored the most obvious, fastest and safest option: Ask Lord Grim himself! That guy must know whether he was part of a club or not or if he joined the Challenger League. The question was just: Would that guy tell the truth when asked?  
Utterly frustrated Muqiu went to bed. He needed to level up faster. Since the other guild already had their eyes on Lord Grim the chances that the club were already informed about him were high. Until now Lord Grim had not shown any interest in the pro league, but this could be his tactic. Of course no club would pursue him forever, but they wouldn't let someone like him go without even trying. Did Tao Xuan already know about Lord Grim? For no particular reason Muqiu doubted it. Chen Yehui hadn't seemed to be too edgy to get that player on their side. Maybe because he thought it was useless and sadly he might be right with this thought. Theoretically it could also be that this Lord Grim wasn't that great. Since he was an unspecialized with a unique silver weapon, he would receive attention no matter how great he really was – in the early stages of the game one had a huge advantage over the other classes. Before the third server was opened many people played as unspecialized, however most played them as a specific class, which did not serve the purpose of unspecialized. In the pro scene one had to be familiar with all classes and should be able to play them. But how many could truly play an unspecialized? The class Muqiu was most familiar with was the Gunner class, so in the end he would probably play the unspecialized mostly like he would play a character from the Gunner class. It was only natural that a person would go with what they were familiar with and used to. Player barely changed their playstyle or even class. How long was that person already playing Glory? It had taken Muqiu quite some time to get familiar with the equipment editor and create his first silver weapon.  
Before Muqiu's thoughts could wander around any longer he fell asleep. His sleep was restless and he woke up a few times during the night. Fortunately he was able to go back to sleep fast and easy again. The next day would surely be exhausting.

Said day started earlier than usual. Not because Muqiu was so edgy to get out of bed and level up or because he had enough sleep. His smartphone decided to wake him up, by informing him about an incoming call from Chen Yehui. Muqiu almost jumped out of his bed when he hear his phone, thinking that he might have overslept – wouldn't be the first time –, so he was a bit confused when he heard Yehui's voice talking to him. Without any greetings the other one had started to inform Muqiu about a wild boss in the Heavenly Domain for which they needed his help. Of course, he would help them. It was just questionable whether he really would be much of help, since he was still tiered as hell, but he did not complain and after hanging up the phone he went to his computer and logged into his Heavenly Domain account. Whenever a will boss appeared the servers were in chaos. Every guild wanted to get the boss! While setting records were done without fighting each other – one only had to fight the dungeon monsters and get out of the dungeon sooner than the others – the guilds had to fight against the other guilds to get the boss. Therefore every guild would bring their best players and as many as they could – such an event was only topped by the "regular" guild wars after the season ended, although the wars mostly happened between the champion's guild and the guild of the second placed team. Fighting for a boss was an experience for itself. One hadn't had only one enemy, but hundreds. And while trying not to be killed by the enemy, one also had to look out for the boss, who also would fight against the players. It was a mess! Muqiu loved it.

After a long time of fighting, Excellent Dynasty finally was able to gain a small advantage. The agro of the boss was now on one of Excellent Dynasty's players and the other guilds had suffered great losses. Unfortunately, now the chances for the other guilds to form temporary alliances was high. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, or something like that. They could only relax when the boss was finally down. This would hopefully happen soon.  
And it happened soon, but not for Excellent Dynasty. Wild bosses existed to be stolen! Everyone knew this and everyone tried to take advantage of it. Why bother with working hard to get the health of the boss down, when one could also wait a bit and let others do the main work? It felt horrible to get a boss stolen after a long and exhausting fight. It felt great, when stealing a boss without much hassle. Every now and then there even were sole players that tried to steal the boss from the guild, but they always failed. Not that it was impossible to steal a boss on your own, but it was hard and with so many other players around that wanted the boss, it was almost impossible. Almost!  
A small group of players was enough to steal the boss away from Excellent Dynasty and the other guilds, right in front of their every eyes.  
What a disgrace!  
Muqiu was standing there on the battlefield looking like a fish out of the water – well, Muqiu was sitting in front of the computer looking like a fish out of the water, while his avatar stood on the battlefield expressionless and unmoving as ever, when not ordered around by his player.  
What a great start for a long day!  
Losing a boss was definitely what he needed after yesterday. Winning and losing were a part of being a professional gamer, so Muqiu wasn't too sad about it. However, this loss was a bit too embarrassing for him to take. How? Why? This was not right! Where? Who? No! Muqiu was confused again. Did this really just happened? The person, who snatched away the boss was a Battle Mage named One Autumn Leaf. This name rang a bell, but Muqiu couldn't say where he had heard that name before. It was definitely not someone from the tenth server, since the challenge for entering the Heavenly Domain could only be taken, when reaching level 50. The character in the tenth server were still far away from that level. So, it must be someone from another server, but which one? Muqiu tried to remember, if there ever had been an outstanding player in the other servers. Yes, every server had them, although most of them were already part of a trainings camp and the few remaining ones were often already a part of a guild. Players like Lord Grim's owner were quite rare. Now there was that Battle Mage. Was he part of a guild? If yes, than not one of the three big ones or Excellent Dynasty. But if he was in a guild, said guild must have already tried to bring him into the team. Was he a pro player? But there weren't any outstanding Battle Mages in the pro scene – outstanding for the pro scene. Of course there were many pro players that performed very well with their Battle Mages and were essential for their teams, but could any of them make a stunt like that? And weren't those great Battle Mages not already part of a guild? Why snatching away a wild boss from your own people? For the same reason Mucheng decided to not help the guild? Was One Autumn Leaf helping a friend? And was said friend Lord Grim? So many questions and no answers! Muqiu walked up and down in his room. It was nothing unusual to get a boss stolen, so after the boss was beaten the guild walked away from the battlefield without any hard feelings. Yes, after losing the boss everyone was a bit sad and it was frustrating to get something so vulnerable stolen, but in the end they all were used to it and got over it in a few seconds. There were other wild bosses that wanted to be killed, so they would focus on that. It was no difference this time – at least not much. Some people would talk about that One Autumn Leaf guy and how he was able to get the boss away from the big guilds – for those who weren't part of one of the big guilds it always was a feast to hear about their misfortune. Therefore they would mock them as soon as such misfortune arrived. Again nothing unusual and the mockery would die down soon anyway.  
One Autumn Leaf, One Autumn Leaf, Muqiu repeated that name in his head over and over again. He had heard that name before. It was someone great! Someone that had drawn attention to himself in the past or else Muqiu wouldn't remember him. Because he was more or less active in all servers he met hundreds and thousands of people. No one was able to remember every single player and their avatars. However, he remember One Autumn Leaf, even if it was just the name. So that person must have been outstanding. One Autumn Leaf, a Battle Mage. Battle Mage One Autumn Leaf. Wasn't it amazing how he could remember all the skills of the different classes, but failed at remembering a simple name? Well, probably it wasn't amazing but sad. Normally he hadn't had a problem with remembering names or faces, but this time his brain completely failed him. On the other hand, when one thought about it rationally it wasn't that surprising. He had met too many players and it was impossible to remember very avatar, also it seemed like his interaction with One Autumn Leaf had been a long time ago, so it was normal to not have the name all too present. Still it irritated him. It was like having something in front of you, but you couldn't reach it, because your arms were just a few inches too short. He knew this name and he knew that this person was amazing, but he could not tell, where he had met the other one and why that person was so amazing.  
One Autumn Leaf. One Autumn Leaf. Battle Mage, One Autumn Leaf. Battle Mage. Battle Mage. One Autumn Leaf. One Autumn Leaf. Battle Mage, One Autumn Leaf.  
Desert Dust!  
Suddenly the name Desert Dust popped into Muqiu's head. Desert Dust was the name of a famous first server avatar that also was now a part of the professional Alliance together with his current owner and creator Han Wenqing.  
One Autumn Leaf had something to do with Desert Dust! And in that case One Autumn Leaf belonged to the first server!  
Faster than light Muqiu went back to his computer and started to search through the internet. Desert Dust had gained some fame in the first server, because he was able to obtain over four thousand wins in the arena without any losses. So whenever people so him fighting they started to record it – maybe they hoped to see him lose and then prove it with a video. Fighting and winning in the arena was one thing, but in Glory it was also possible to fight outside the arena against other players. A loss outside of the arena would not be recorded and therefore one could always deny it as long as the other party did not have some kind of proof. Han Wenqing, the creator and owner of Desert Dust, wasn't this kind of a person. If he lost, he lost. End of the story. There was no reason for him to deny it. Next time he would simple win against his opponent. However, this was something no one knew back then and it was often that such people had a problem with losing.  
After typing Desert Dusts name into the search engine, he found what he wanted, at least to a certain extent. There were a bunch of videos that showed Desert Dust fighting. Unfortunately, most of those videos were from the pro scene – some low quality videos made by fans with their phones. What Muqiu wanted was a video of the time before the Alliance had been established. And so the time passed. Muqiu click from one video to the next, sometimes watching the same fight over and over again, just from different perspectives, until he finally found the video he so desperately looked for. But luck wasn't on his side. Whoever made the recoding had made it while being in probably the worst position for recording. One could see the names Desert Dust and One Autumn Leaf and from time to time one could also the avatars and their attacks, but the majority of the video was useless, because one could see anything. Why did life hate him so much? Or was that some plot set up by One Autumn Leaf? Lord Grim and One Autumn Leaf must been in cahoots with each other! Both were such a hassle! On the positive side of things, he had found a video and there was still the chance that there were more like that. Hopefully with better quality. Muqiu was no one, who gave up so fast. If he were such a person, he would have never "mastered" the equipment editor.  
Today was a very strange day. First he was woken up by a call from the guild leader Chen Yehui, because Excellent Dynasty needed help fighting a wild boss, then said boss was stolen by a Battle Mage called One Autumn Leaf, who seemed to be a first server character and had some connection with Desert Dust, who was considered a god-level character and titled "The king of fighting" and now after going through so many videos Muqiu even found one in which his very own first server account Autumn Tree was fighting together with One Autumn Leaf against a wild boss. What the hell? How could he forget someone, he had killed bosses with? And it was not only one time! There were many more videos like this and their teamwork was splendid! Muqiu wanted to hit his head against something. A part of him didn't want to believe all of this. Another part of him told him that this was the very truth in front of him.  
Muqiu had since long logged out of the game. Why bother with talking about the boss fight or wasting time with running around in the Heavenly Domain, when he had better things to do – like leveling up so he could get in contact with Lord Grim. So much for his plan. Now he was wasting time with looking for videos and trying to confirm whether he and One Autumn Leaf really knew each other and had fought wild bosses in the first server. For this he logged into his first server account Autumn Tree and searched through his friend list. It was a strange feeling going through said list. He remembered barely any name listed there. Qi Breaker was the name he was the most familiar with and could put face to. He had met the creator of Qi Breaker in the first server and both had joint Excellent Dynasty, later joining the pro team Excellent Era as the very first players of said team, winning three championships together. Wu Xuefeng had retired after their third championship and ever since then they had not talked to each other. Not because they were mad with each other or anything, it was simply because Muqiu had no contact information of his old comrade. Maybe the other one would have known anything about One Autumn Leaf.  
Some other names also sounded familiar to him – some because they were also part of Excellent Dynasty from the very first second and had joint the pro team later and were still there, at least the in-game characters, and some because he was still in contact with them through the other servers. Although the number other the latter become lesser and lesser every year. The majority of them name, however, sounded unfamiliar to him, but this wasn't all too surprising. What was surprising to him in a certain way, was the very fact that One Autumn Leaf was indeed on his friend list. Now Muqiu felt dump. Extremely dump! Should he write the other one? They were friends – at least in-game – and had once fought bosses together, so he could talk with him about the old times, or something like that. On the other hand, what kind of good would this do? He had wasted so many hours for what? To find out that he indeed knew One Autumn Leaf and now what? That guy belonged to the first server and apparently hasn't joint a pro team, so it was safe to assume that he wasn't interested in the pro league – this kind of player did exist. So why bother with talking to him? Muqiu had wasted enough time! Time he could have used to level up and go after Lord Grim. However, there was still the possibility of One Autumn Leaf and Lord Grim knowing each other – maybe even being friends. So, he could get some information about Lord Grim from One Autumn Leaf. Was that logical? Muqiu doubted himself a bit. Why was that One Autumn Leaf appearing now? All those years that guy had done nothing to gain attention. Had the player stopped playing Glory and was restarting now or had given it to someone else? Or was One Autumn Leaf a rival of Lord Grim, who didn't like how much attention Lord Grim was receiving, because of the tenth server? This was a possibility. Or they belonged to the same player. On a second thought, why should this player stop playing with One Autumn Leaf and come back with Lord Grim, just to start using One Autumn Leaf again? Stupid thought.  
While Muqiu was still musing over whether he should write One Autumn Leaf or not, he received a message from the latter. A simple greeting followed by the words "It's been awhile" and "How are you doing". For a moment Muqiu wondered, if that guy really remembered him. Probably not. If that guy hadn't logged in for some time, this kind of greeting would be suitable for everyone in his friend list. Muqiu typed his greetings and answer, while hoping to remember a bit more about the other player. Desert Dust had made himself a name in the first server because he hadn't lost in the arena for quite some time. Even outside of the arena people had challenged him, but never had one reported to have defeated Desert Dust. Could it be that One Autumn Leaf had been the on to end Desert Dust's winning streak? The videos he had found about Desert Dust's and One Autumn Leaf's fight did not show the outcome. Now that he thought about it, he could also asked Han Wenqing, if he remembered a player named One Autumn Leaf.  
A replay: "Are you still with Excellent Dynasty?"  
Of course he was and he even was with Excellent Era, but this was something he would keep to himself for now.  
"Yes, I am. You are not? Why?"  
Muqiu assumed that the other one also once had been a part of Excellent Dynasty and taking into consideration what had happened not so long ago it was safe to assume he wasn't anymore.  
"Circumstances."  
What a beautiful answer for the trash bin!  
"I see. That's sad. By the way, the way you stole the boss was quite impressive. The group that helped you, were they your friends? Have you joint another guild?"  
Muqiu still doubted that One Autumn Leaf was part of a guild – normally after getting a boss the guild would brag about it, at least some of their members, however this hadn't happened this time.  
"No, we just helping each other out from time to time. And no, I haven't joint another guild yet."  
Hasn't joint yet? So he was planning on joining one? After leaving a guild one had to wait a few days until one could join another guild. When had One Autumn Leaf left Excellent Dynasty and how could the guild overlook such a player?  
"Who are "they"?", was what Muqiu wanted to asked, but did not dare to.  
"What have you been doing all this time? Were you bored by Glory?", he asked instead.  
"Nothing, just playing games. I logged in from time to time, but unfortunately I couldn't spent as much time with Glory as I wanted to. But now I am back. Want to kill some bosses with me?"  
Yes and no. Muqiu wanted to hang out with One Autumn Leaf a bit longer and find out more about him, but he didn't want to betray his guild – he probably had to do this in the tenth server already. Before Muqiu could write a response his phone started to ring again. Chen Yehui was calling him again. Did he need help with another boss? Or had he some information on Lord Grim? Just by looking at his phone, Muqiu would get an answer, but he didn't want to waste time right now. What if One Autumn Leaf would log out, while he was talking to the guild leader? However, One Autumn Leaf's owner was a very kind person and helped Muqiu out again.  
"Ah, sorry. I have to leave for now. Let's fight some bosses another time. Bye."  
And with that One Autumn Leaf logged out. Muqiu didn't even had the time to reply – to protest. Now it was only him and his still ringing phone, which he wanted to smash against the next wall.  
After letting out a sigh Muqiu picked up the phone and listened to Yehui's words. Nothing special. That guy just needed help again with another boss. Before hanging up, Muqiu asked about information on Lord Grim and his group, also he told Yehui to gather information on One Autumn Leaf – what has that guy done in the last years, why had no one paid attention to him and was there a connection between him and Lord Grim.

The following days were quite monotones. Muqiu would level in the tenth server, while trying to gather information on his own. Furthermore, he also looked out for One Autumn Leaf, although their conversations often were extremely short and never got anywhere too deep.  
The trainings room had more than enough computer, therefore Muqiu was able to log in into his tenth server account and into his first server account. Mucheng was curious why her brother logged into two accounts, but she did not bother with asking. It was none of her business and playing with her new friends was more interesting – maybe Muqiu was just testing out something. She would simply enter the room, greet him, set down and log in. While playing they would hold small talk about their days – what had they done the other day and what were they planning to do today – and Muqiu would sometimes asked her about Lord Grim – of course he tried to make it sound as if he was interested in her and her new friends as a whole, but Mucheng had long discovered his true intention. As nice as she was, she stayed silent and simply answered his questions honestly.

"Say, Mucheng, do you know this Lord Grim guy personally?", Muqiu asked one day.  
"Yes, I do."  
"How have you met? Is he someone from those sponsor things?"  
"No, we just happened to bump into each other one day. We had a little chat and since he was playing in the tenth server, I decided to play there too. He is a nice guy."  
With her last statement Mucheng tried to make her brother feel at ease. Although he did not say it, to her it was obvious that he was a bit worried.  
"What about the other ones? Have you met any of them?"  
"Um, Soft Mist. I met Soft Mist a while ago… Well, we only greeted each other, so it was only a very brief meeting. But she is a kind person, we often chat with each other."  
Female players were relatively seldom, especially in the pro circle. So, Mucheng was always very happy when she was able to meet another talented female player. Soft Mist's player was quite talented – she had only started playing Glory in the tenth server and was already a threat to many experts, with a bit more training and experience she would even pose a threat to a pro player.  
"So, you don't know that Steamed Bun Invasion and One Inch Ash?"  
"No, I do not. But does it matter? Outside of our group activities I barely have anything to do with those two. One Inch Ash is very polite and sounds very young. Steamed Bun is quite funny, but he also can be very annoying – let's hope that we never ever have to deal with Huang Shaotian and Steamed Bun together."  
Although Steamed Bun did not talk as fast and much as Shaotian, the babbling of the first one could drive someone nuts. Mucheng often could only laugh about it – it was nice to see how much fun Steamed Bun seemed to have with playing Glory his way and be part of their small group.

To keep people interests a game needed challenges – something to work towards, a goal. That was the reason why the Heavenly Domain had been established in the first place. The Heavenly Domain was a place where only those, who were able to complete the quests for it, would gather and tried to prove that they were the best. In the normal server one could simply win a match because of a level advantage, for example, while everyone in the Heavenly Domain had already reached the max level. So, to make yourself stronger than the others, one either needed the skill or have better equipment. The fight for good equipment was a harsh one and it was so much easier to lose the little bit of good equipment one had, than obtaining better equipment. Still, there was a goal: Reach the Heavenly Domain, after reaching it, prove that you can survive in such a harsh "world" and become a well-known player there. This was more or less what many players out there wanted, even those who may already know that they had no change to become a pro player: Become well-known. There were players like Changing Spring, who were known by almost everyone. He was the overall guild leader of Blue Brook Guild – the in-game guild of the pro team Blue Rain. Only people that were completely new to Glory or did not pay any attention to the players and events around them, wouldn't know about him. The goal of the pro players was a shared one: win the championship! Year after year, day after day, they all did nothing but train for the championship, in hopes to hold the trophy in their hands at the end of the season.

"Why don't you join us? You have an account now, am I right? So, let's clear a dungeon together. I am sure, you and Lord Grim will get a long pretty well. He loves Glory with such a passion, just like you."  
"Um…", Muqiu simply responded, since he didn't know what to say.  
"My level isn't that high at the moment. I will need a little bit more time to catch up."  
It wasn't a lie, although Muqiu gave his card to someone of the guild to level up, during the time Muqiu couldn't play – like when he was asleep or helped the guild out in other servers – he still was a few levels away from Lord Grim and his party. If he power leveled today he might be able to reach them at the end of the day or at the start of the next. At this very moment, he regretted his decision to start from the very beginning – he could have asked for an account that wasn't part of the guild. Every guild had such cards and they were usually used to spy on the other guilds. Consequently, there hadn't been any reason to take a card that needed to go through all the first steps.  
"Oh, we can wait. We're not in a hurry."  
Without any further comment Muqiu returned to his own computer and continued to level up. On another screen a message popped up. When taking a look, Muqiu hoped that One Autumn Leaf had written again, but it was just a massage from Chen Yehui, who of course also had an account in the first server – it was a borrowed account. From the current guild members, those who were employed by the club, less than a handful were from the first server. Over the years some guild members changed into other departments inside the club, while others left, because they had lost interest in Glory, found something better for them or had to go, because they weren't good enough anymore. Even as a member of the guild, one had to have good skills, since it was the duty of the higher up guild members to obtain rare material. Such could only be done with great skills. Every now and then Muqiu would think about all the people he had seen, all those that had left since the foundation of team Excellent Era. A few names were clear in his mind, while other weren't, but he could vaguely remember their avatars and what kind of connection he had with them. Whenever he thought of the past, he felt incredibly old! Such thoughts made him realize how much he had changed of the years, how much Glory had changed, how much the Alliance had changed. Changes weren't bad by default, they were needed to move this world on, but sometimes they left Muqiu speechless.  
Chen Yehui had contacted him to ask for help in a boss hunt. Muqiu was about to decline. His priority was his tenth server account. He wasn't too far away from Lord Grim and therefore was able to bump into him from time to time or to observe him, still he was too weak to follow him into dungeons – the place where Lord Grim and his group spent most of their time. Before he was able to even type out his reply, another message popped up. This time it was One Autumn Leaf asking for his aid in a boss hunt – most likely the same boss as the one Chen Yehui was after. Without any hesitation Muqiu agreed to help One Autumn Leaf. All his reasoning for not being able to help out Yehui and his priorities were forgotten. Lord Grim wouldn't run away so fast and speaking realistically, the chances that Muqiu would be able to convince Lord Grim's player to join Excellent Era in just a few days – soon the summer break would come to an end for the pro players – was almost zero. So, there was nothing wrong with spending some time with an old friend, right?


	3. Part 3

For the boss hunt Muqiu switched accounts. His first server account was too well-known and therefore would probably cause more problems than anything. Simply being online had already caused enough stress – stealing a boss from his own people would be too much.  
At the meeting point Muqiu saw four, not including One Autumn Leaf himself, other avatars. Alright, there were more than just four, but those four stood near One Autumn Leaf, so he assumed that those were very important members of the group. He couldn't see any guild tags, however, Muqiu was sure that all of them belong to a guild. In his opinion it was not possible to assemble so many players and make them work together, when they weren't from the same guild.  
When the other players saw his avatar approaching, they turned around, ready to fight the intruder. Of course, Muqiu hadn't had tried to hid himself. He had been invited by One Autumn Leaf, so he more or less assumed that his partners knew about him coming over. Seemingly this wasn't the case.  
"You come", One Autumn Leaf greeted him, which caused the other four avatars – or better said their respective players – to relax.  
The Battle Mage step towards Muqiu's Sharpshooter as a gesture that he was welcomed.  
"Of course."  
What had the other one expected? Did Muqiu somehow appear so untrustworthy? And if One Autumn Leaf had no trust in him, then why had said person invited him over in the first place? Or was he overthinking right now? Probably.  
"I have to admit that I was a bit worried that you might not show up. I mean, we will snatch the boss away right under the nose of your fellow guild members of Excellent Dynasty. Are you sure, you are up for this?"  
Muqiu wanted to commit murder!  
As soon as the other four heard that he was a member of Excellent Dynasty he could feel a strange aura coming from the avatars. Glory was quite advanced with their technologies, however it was still not possible for a player to change the facial expression of their avatar to fit their respective mood. Therefore, Muqiu could only assume what kind of expression the players wore at the moment and he was sure none of them were smiling.  
"I wouldn't be here, if there were any problems with that. It won't kill them to lose a boss once in a while. Although I have to admit that you sound quite confident. It looks like you got a lot of players to help you in this hunt, but will they be enough to go up against the big guilds? It's not only Excellent Dynasty you have to fight for the boss."  
"Don't worry about that. We were able to kill some bosses before or have you already forgotten about the last boss?"  
So, the last time One Autumn Leaf had already worked together with this group? Sounded logical and so much better than him and a handful of other players being able to kill a boss under the nose of the big guilds. Muqiu did not like to use the word "impossible", especially not in Glory, because theoretically everything was possible when approached in the right way, but he was sure that it was almost impossible to kill a boss with only a few people, while being under attack of the big guilds and their experts. And no avatar could have such a high damage output to bring down a boss in such a short time. Having a large group to help out sounded more realistic and logical – and it did not hurt as much as to lose to a small group of some random players.

Without much of an instruction the group set out for the hunt. Muqiu followed One Autumn Leaf. As always the battlefield around the Boss was a chaos. Excellent Dynasty seemed to be in the lead at the moment and this made Muqiu's heart arch a bit, since he now had to steal the boss away from them. He really didn't like the thought of stealing the boss. The materials dropped by the boss were important to the team. With them their research team could experiment and figure out how to improve the silver equipment of the team's avatars. Of course, losing one boss would not kill a team, however, it was never certain how many bosses a guild would be able to get and what kind of items would be dropped by the boss. Furthermore, although Excellent Era was a strong team Excellent Dynasty had some problems keeping up in the game. That was one of the reasons why Muqiu helped out so much. He wanted to support his team to the utter most and supporting the guild was a way to also support the team. Well, if things went the way he wanted them to go, than One Autumn Leaf would also rejoin Excellent Dynasty and Excellent Era – for this however, he had to prove his skills, since Muqiu hadn't had much of a chance to really judge them until now – and Lord Grim would follow soon as well. Sacrificing a few rare materials for two great players was acceptable. At this point Muqiu was just a little bit too optimistic. He didn't know that One Autumn Leaf and Lord Grim were the same person – it had been an assumption based on nothing but a thought, so it was already forgotten. Also he didn't know the reason why One Autumn Leaf had left Excellent Dynasty or when he had done so. However, this was something Muqiu had on his list of thing to ask the other one. It was just that the time hadn't been right.  
"You're still with us?", One Autumn Leaf suddenly asked.  
"Hu… Um… Yeah, still here", Muqiu answered.  
He really must seem suspicious or something like that since he was questioned all the time.  
"That's great. You know, this is your last chance to back out, in case you do not want to get in the way of your guild."  
How nice. One Autumn Leaf was thinking about his feelings for his guild. Or better said that guy was worried that his feelings would get in the way. Well, who could hold it against One Autumn Leaf?  
"I'm fine. Just so you know, I even ditched my guild to help you out. So don't think about it anymore. It's fine."  
Whether it was a good idea to inform One Autumn Leaf about him ditching his team or not was something Muqiu hadn't thought about and couldn't even care less.  
"How about we now take care of the boss or else Excellent Dynasty will get it", he suggested.  
"Good, then let me explain the plan", One Autumn Leaf said as if they had all the time in the world to fight the boss.  
Muqiu couldn't believe it. Every guild was in a hurry to get the agro of the boss and kill it, before the other guild could steal it away, and here he was with One Autumn Leaf, who acted as if it was just them and the boss, which willingly waited for them to kill it. Although the health of a boss was relatively high, it still had a fixed amount of health and to get the agro one had to cause damage. Damage meant reducing the health of the boss. To get the agro switched meant causing more damage – therefore reducing the health of the boss – than the other party. So, waiting for too long would do no good, unless they wanted to help the opponent to get the boss. However, after listening to the plan Muqiu understood, why they were not moving.

Muqiu was quite astonished how well One Autumn Leaf guided his group, which was the smallest of all, but probably the one with the most skilled players. Hard to judge how skilled all players were, since Muqiu only focused on his group and it was impossible to look out for every player and make judgments, while focusing on battling the boss. Moreover, he was only here for One Autumn Leaf, so he paid close attention to him. He had a good understanding of the game – when to use a skill, when to use a normal attack, when to dodge – and impressive skills – good judgment of the situation and the skills of his teammates, fast decision-making and a high hand speed. That guy was playing for a long time, which was not surprising considering that One Autumn Leaf was a first server account. Consequently one could assume that the person behind was playing Glory for about ten years. This was even something rare in the pro scene. Thinking about it that way, Muqiu wondered how old the other one was. When the Alliance was first established a player had to be at least eighteen years old, nowadays one could become a pro player with fourteen. What didn't change was the age at which a player was considered old and when they were about to retire. Most players decided to retire between twenty-five and twenty-seven – depending on the skills of the player. Of course there were a few exceptions, but those were so rare that one could ignore them. So was it worth to run after someone, who may only have one or two years as pro player ahead of them? Would Excellent Era be willing to hire such a player? It was a risk.  
When the boss fell another event happened that surprised Muqiu. It was One Autumn Leaf, who pricked up the drops of the boss, which wasn't surprising, but laid it down in front of the other five – including Muqiu – when they had all gathered together. "Why" was all he could asked himself. Normally, when a guild got a boss the drops would be collected and put into the guild's storage. There was no reason to pick the drops up and lay them down shortly after. For him it was already clear that those people were not some random players, they all belong to a guild. How else could it be possible that so many players, skilled players, were gathered together? Also if they were loners they would probably want some kind of reward for their help, but a boss never dropped hundreds of items. Ergo the majority would get nothing for their effort, hence the players here were probably from a guild and helped because this was what a guild did – getting materials for their teams. Furthermore, Muqiu doubted – well, he actual did not even think about this possibility – that they did this just for him, since he was an outsider and probably would asked for a reward. Only after the four other avatars that already had been close to One Autumn Leaf, when Muqiu had first met all of them – he assumed that those four were core members of the guild –, started to discuss, who wanted what item, he understood that those people were indeed from a guild – from different guilds. This fact confused and surprised him a lot. It was something uncommon for guilds to help each other out like that. While it was normal to form temporary alliances with other guilds to get an advantage, it was also normal to betrayal the other guild as soon as possible to get the rewards all alone. Sharing the drops of a boss had never happened before, but this was exactly what was going on right in front of Muqiu's very own eyes. Was the world about to end and everyone tried to get some plus points, so they would not go to hell? Would there be a greater reward in case the drops were shared? Had he missed something? Some new update?  
"Are you sleeping?", a voice asked. "It's your time to pick an item. Hurry up."  
Muqiu snapped out of his confused state just to enter into the next one, however this time being "awake".  
"My turn?", he hesitantly asked.  
"Yes, your turn. You helped out too, so it is only fair to share with you as well. And you probably need something to make up to your guild, right?"  
Muqiu ignored the last part of One Autumn Leaf's statement and took a look at the items on the ground. He didn't know what kind of item the research department needed the most at the moment, but this was probably also the case for the other ones, so he just picked something. The other four – not counting One Autumn Leaf – did not seem too pleased with Muqiu, but this was just his assumption, since it was still impossible to see the players' expression or hear their thoughts. Yet it was understandable that those four, which by the way were all guild leaders themselves, were not all too happy with Muqiu around. First of all, despite working together for some time now, the trust in this alliance and each other was not too strong yet. Second Muqiu belonged to Excellent Dynasty, which was an extremely big guild, with even some branch guilds, since there was just a specific amount of players that could join a guild. Therefore, Excellent Dynasty had more than enough materials in the eyes of the other guild leaders, who were all from quite small guilds, quite small teams. Of course, he deserved a reward, just like them, since he had helped them out. But why was he helping them out in the first place? Thirdly, having to share with yet another person would reduce the amount of items they would get – they would not fight each other over how many items one would get, since it evened each other out of the course of boss hunting. One time guild A got more items, next time it was guild B, then guild C and so on. They could live with that. Also their overall success in boss hunting had increased by a lot, so it wasn't like they would lose out on materials in the big picture – they just had to be more selective.  
But who were they to question One Autumn Leaf? It was thanks to him that they now had a realistic chance against the bigger guilds. Maybe he was trying to get that other player to leave Excellent Dynasty? Although it was quite questionable, if this was possible, because normally the guild members were loyal to their guild, to their teams. There were players that would switch guild, but most of them were people that either had no interest in the pro scene, thus did not care about what club they would support or not, or fans of a specific player, who they would follow in case said player switched teams.

It didn't took too long for the guild leaders to split up the drops. Afterwards everyone would go their own way again. Only one guild leader stayed behind. Muqiu also stayed, because he wasn't sure what to do now. He wanted to talk a bit with One Autumn Leaf to get some information out of the latter one. On the other hand, he had tried to do this for quite some time now and hadn't archived anything. Maybe it would be better to go back to the tenth server and level up, so he could met up with Lord Grim. Chen Yehui and the other guild members should take care to gain information on One Autumn Leaf and Lord Grim. Therefore Muqiu bid his farewell and switched accounts and spent the rest of the day with leveling up. As he had assumed he was able to reach Lord Grim's level at the evening. Now he could follow the other one without any problems – he did not have to be at the same level as Lord Grim to follow him around or go to dungeons, but it was easier with the appropriated level. During his leveling up session he saw that Lord Grim was also online and running around with his group, however he did not approach them or secretly followed them like he had done before. As soon as he reach the right level, he would do this. So, now that he was at Lord Grim's level he only had to wait to see him again. Before that he would take a small break. He hadn't eaten anything since the morning. Consequently, Muqiu logged out and made his way to the door to leave the room. Mucheng was busy with fighting dungeon creatures and therefore did not pay any attention to her brother until the latter one asked her, whether she also wanted something to eat. As response she only said yes. She had to focus on the monsters around her.  
Since Muqiu was a more or less well-known pro player he had to cover himself up – like he had done before –, when he left the club building, especially since it was quite crowed at the moment – people were on their way home from work. It was a bit of a hassle to cover oneself up, since it was still very warm outside and every additional piece of cloth was a piece too much – it was easier during the cold periods. However, Muqiu was a pro, not only in Glory. His way led him down the road towards the next fast food restaurant – going into the club's canteen was too easy and Muqiu was not in the mood for the food there. The restaurant was full with people either already sitting at the tables and eating or waiting in line for their food. It was the complete opposite to the scenario a few days ago, where almost no one was around – this was probably due to the fact that the last time it was later than now and therefore less people were wandering the streets. Luckily he was a patience person and without any second thought he waited in line. While waiting he thought about his next steps. How exactly should he approach Lord Grim? Of course he could wait until they met by chance and stated to talk with each other, but the problem was that he could not control when this would happen. On the other hand, he planned on following the other one around, so the chances of meeting each other was high and a conversation was easily started. Or should he be more straightforward and immediately challenge Lord Grim to a duel? How useful was that? As an unspecialized character Lord Grim had more low level skills at hand, thus was at an advantage, since he was more flexible than the other classes. Also this would make his sneaking around to be in vain. Well, theoretically and practically it would have been so much easier, if he had been honest with his sister and asked her about Lord Grim and maybe arrange a meeting with his player at the end. But following the easy road was probably too boring for him, so he decided to take some turns – Muqiu had no explanation, why he took such a detour. He really must be bored. Because of all his thinking Muqiu almost missed his turn to order his food. Maybe less thinking was better sometimes.

When he was about to leave, he almost bumped into someone at the door. Muqiu was not one of those people that remembered every face they saw immediately, especially not when he only had met that person once before and just seen for a brief moment, but he remembered that he had met a person with beautiful hands that did not match with the rest of the person's appearance. Someone who looked more dead than alive. This someone was standing right in front of him now and apologized for almost dumping into him. Muqiu apologized as well, and maybe he also should apologize for starring so much, but before anyone could say more the other person had already left Muqiu behind, who didn't mind this and went back to the club. Mucheng was probably quite hungry by now and a little sister shouldn't be left hunger for too long!  
She was still in the trainings room, when he came back. Instead of clearing a dungeon, she was chatting with Soft Mist, while killing some monsters. Those two worked quite well together.  
"I am back", Muqiu said and started to place the food next to Mucheng, so she could take whatever she wanted.  
Afterwards he sat down next to her and watched her playing while eating. Normally it was not allowed to eat in the trainings room, but besides them there was no one else in here, hence there was no one who could complain about them breaking the rules – there was no one who knew they were breaking the rules. Soft Mist and Cleansing Mist were not alone, One Inch Ash was also there and provided support. Besides those three another three players were with them, however Muqiu did not recognized them. Were those three new to the group? Another three great players? From the information Chen Yehui had given him, Muqiu knew that Soft Mist and Steamed Bun only started playing Glory within the tenth server, there were no information on One Inch Ash, but Muqiu assumed that that person played for a bit longer – there was no need to talk about Mucheng – and now there were probably three more players with great potential. Was that even possible? Muqiu's excitement disappeared soon. Although those three were good, they were definitely not good enough to be taken into consideration for becoming pro players. They would be a good addition to the guild!  
Since Muqiu looked at Mucheng's screen, he could only see what her avatar saw, thus he had a relatively good overlook over the situation.  
"Soft Mist is really good. Are you sure that she just started playing recently?", Muqiu commented.  
Soft Mist's improvement over the weeks he had an eye on Lord Grim's group was also very amazing.  
"She says "thank you" and yes, she only started seriously playing Glory in the tenth server. Before that she had played a few matches for a friend in the arena of the Heavenly Domain", Mucheng replayed.  
She had given her brother's compliment and question to Soft Mist, who was quite happy to hear that a pro player – Mucheng had never made it a secret that she was a pro player herself towards Lord Grim and his group, although it was probably just Soft Mist and Lord Grim that actually knew – thought she was good, despite not sounding impressed or overly happy. But that was the way Soft Mist's owner was.  
"Ask her, if she is interested in becoming a pro player."  
If Soft Mist was a friend of Lord Grim and became a pro player, maybe she could convince Lord Grim's player to also start to play professionally.  
"She said that she is not interested."  
Of course she was not!  
"Well, that's a shame."

Watching his sister play with her friends made Muqiu tired. Maybe he should go to bed earlier today or move a bit around to get awake. Now that he had reached the first goal, he could not slack off! Lord Grim was near and he had to grab the other one as soon as possible. Although the summer break wasn't over yet, the different professional esports teams would start with their training soon. During the summer break players and sometimes also avatars, would transfer. Those players had to be integrated into the team and this would be accomplished by training together before the new season started – it could cost one a match if the club would wait with training together until the new season. Excellent Era may not have made any changes yet, but this didn't mean that they neither had any intention of making any changes or that they wouldn't start with their training before the new season. As soon as the training started, Muqiu would have less time for the game. Consequently, he wouldn't be able to follow Lord Grim around all day and he had to search for the other one all the time. According to his observations Lord Grim's player was often online from the late afternoon to the early morning. A night person. However, Muqiu and Mucheng both couldn't be up all night, as soon as training started.  
"I'm going to the restroom", Mucheng suddenly said.  
Without realizing it, Muqiu had spaced out and was brought back by his sister's words.  
"And you should level up faster, so you can join us in the dungeons."  
After Mucheng left the room, Muqiu went back to his own computer and logged into his first server account – maybe One Autumn Leaf was online. At the same time he wrote Chen Yehui a message with his tenth server account. The other one hopefully had some new information about One Autumn Leaf and Lord Grim. Unfortunately, One Autumn Leaf wasn't online – the same applied to Lord Grim. However, Chen Yehui indeed had some news, besides One Autumn Leaf snatching yet another boss away from the guild.  
One Autumn Leaf had been quite active in the first few years of Glory and was well-known by the players, until he suddenly vanished without a trace. Years later he returned and probably spent his time with leveling up, just to leave again. Afterwards he would show up from time to time to clear some dungeons and set some records, which was not notice, because like Lord Grim did in the tenth server, he set those records under the name of a guild, which he would leave after setting the record. Differently than Lord Grim, he never made a record that was too impressive – only beating the one before by a few seconds or a minute – and did not ask for much in return. From what Chen Yehui could gather, it seemed that none of the big guilds had approached One Autumn Leaf and neither had he made a move on the big guilds. What was his goal? From what Muqiu knew, Lord Grim had a silver weapon, so it was obvious why Lord Grim asked for rare materials in return for helping to set a record or getting a first kill. Also it was safe to assume that his silver weapon needed a lot of rare material to upgrade, since Lord Grim always wanted a high number of the rare materials. One Autumn Leaf also had a silver weapon, but it seemed like he did not need any material for it or did he have most of the materials he needed for an upgrade? Doubtful, when One Autumn Leaf left many years ago, then he probably did not know much about the "new" materials and during the time to level up, he probably couldn't gather a piece of every new material to study it. Or was he getting materials for Lord Grim? Both used more or less the same method to get rare materials, so there was a chance that they knew each other or even were played by the same person, right?  
Instead of thinking more about it, Muqiu asked about Lord Grim. However, there were no new information available. Chen Yehui had found a few accounts in other serves that had a similar sounding name, but none of these avatars had ever shown any remarkable performance. Therefore, Yehui concluded that Lord Grim's player had no accounts in other servers. Another assumption of his was that the player was new to Glory, since he was playing as an unspecialized. While it wasn't too outstanding to use and unspecialized in the beginning of the game to figure out what class to choose at level twenty, it was strange and eye-catching to use this "class" after level 20. So normally even new players would choose a class right away. Furthermore, those who may be new to Glory may not always be new to games in general and Glory was not the only game that had different classes. While it sounded reasonable for a beginner to choose an unspecialized first, it was questionable whether said person would be able to create a silver weapon. Also, after watching Lord Grim from time to time, Muqiu had the feeling that the player behind Lord Grim was very knowledged about Glory and its classes. The other one had chosen unspecialized on purpose and not to figure out what class to take later – why creating a form shifting weapon, when one had the intention to bind themselves to one class, and Lord Grim had already passed level 20 and hadn't changed class. Yet Muqiu did not say anything about this to Yehui. It did not matter anyway. In the end all he could do was to ask Lord Grim himself. And this was what he wanted to do right away, but luck wasn't with him, because Lord Grim wasn't even online. Well, in that case he should wait for him. Without any haste Muqiu made his way to the area in which Mucheng had trained with her new friends. There he looked for a good hiding place and waited. Mucheng had returned by then.  
"You're back."  
"Yeah."  
"Any plans for now?"  
"Not really. What about you? Have you leveled up enough to join us in the dungeons later?"  
"Later?"  
"Yeah, everyone is eating dinner right now. But as soon as they finished, we will go into the dungeon once more."  
"You should eat dinner as well. It is already cold."  
While Mucheng had played, she barely had touched the food her brother had brought her, because she was too focused on fighting, thus forgetting to eat. Now that there was nothing to do for her, she had time to eat, even when the food would probably do not taste that good anymore, since it was already cold. Theoretically, she could go and warm it up again, but honestly she was too lazy to do that now. She had no problem to eat her dinner cold.  
Mucheng ate, while waiting for the rest of the group to come online again. Muqiu on the other hand chatted with Yehui a little bit – although it was more Yehui bothering Muqiu with requests and simply being annoying, while Muqiu tried to ignore most of it – and every now and then took a look whether One Autumn Leaf was online again. Somehow he felt the desire to talk to him and Han Wenqing about the old times. Would Wenqing remember his once so called rival? Would he even care? Probably not.

"They are back. Where are you?", Mucheng suddenly said.  
Where he was? Nearby. In his hideout. But he couldn't tell her, so he asked for her position, so he could go there. Sounded reasonable right? He had leveled up somewhere and had to move to her place now, so he needed to know her position. After she gave him her whereabouts she focused on her group again, which she informed about his coming. They decided to wait for him, while killing monsters. Muqiu silently watched. Moving around a bit to have a better look from time to time and to make it seem, as if he was still on the way – this was so stupid, because Mucheng would know that it was him pretty soon anyway. There was absolutely no reason to hide anything from her and yet he was doing it.  
Muqiu's plan was quite simple. Attack Lord Grim and find out how good he really was first hand. Fighting monsters was one thing. Fighting against another player was something different, especially when said player was a professional. Of course he was aware of the fact that Lord Grim had an advantage, because he could use the low level skills of all classes, as long as he had put some skill points into them, but he did not care much about winning or losing this fight. As simple as his plan sounded, the execution wasn't. Somehow the Brawler Steamed Bun Invasion got in his way – trying to protect Lord Grim or whatever –, so he had to deal with the other one first, which was done quite fast. After being pushed away Steamed Bun tried to get back once more, but got stopped by Lord Grim, who was now in combat with Muqiu's avatar. The fight didn't last long. The advantages for an unspecialized were too great at the moment, but Muqiu more or less had now a better understanding of the other ones skills and he was more than hundred percent sure that Lord Grim's player was not new to Glory. Was he a pro player messing around in game? This thought had always been in his mind, but his doubts were too great. There were too many aspects that spoke against it. And even when he ignored Lord Grim's behavior towards the guilds until now – normally a pro player would not work against his team's guild and only a few paid attention to the equipment editor, since there was a department that took care of this things – it was questionable which pro player had so much time to spend for the game. Also Lord Grim often was online at night – a time where pro players usually were in bed. They had to maintain a good sleeping schedule or else their performance would be affected. Maybe someone from a trainings camp? Those in the trainings camp were a little bit freer in what they did and how much time they could spent in the game besides their training sessions. But if it was someone, who was able to play as an unspecialized, that person must have great skills and be at the top of the trainings camp. Someone like this would sooner or later get the chance to become a part of the main team. There was no reason to try to show off like this.  
"Was all this secretiveness just for fighting Lord Grim?", Mucheng asked nonchalant.  
At first Muqiu did not react. What should he say? Yes, all this secretiveness just for a short fight with Lord Grim. Somehow only thinking to give this answer was somewhat embarrassing.  
In the end he still replayed that way, since there was nothing else to say.  
"You could have fought him in the arena."  
"Yeah, I could have, but I didn't. Does it matter?"  
No, it did not matter, whether they fought on the map or in the arena.  
"Want to rob him in as well?"  
"One can always try. It would be such a waste, when someone like him does not join the competitive scene, don't you think?"  
"Maybe. But how will you get him to join Excellent Era now? Fight him until you win? Fight him until he is so annoyed by you that he joins?"  
"No, I will simply talk to him. Right now I just wanted to confirm a few things and see how good he is first hand."  
"What kind of things?"  
"If he is a new player. How he combines the different skills."  
"He is not new to Glory. He plays since the very beginning. You should have said something. I could have helped you."  
Yes, he could have, but then things would have been too easy! He would have wasted so much time and energy. What should he have done with all that not wasted time and energy?  
"You could have told him, where Lord Grim's player is in the first place or suggest me to come with you, when you visited him."  
She could have, but why should she have done so? How should she know that Muqiu wanted to meet the person behind Lord Grim? If he wanted something from her, he needed to talk to her and not simply assume she would somehow know it.  
"You could have asked. How should I know, what you want to know or not? But now you can ask him yourself. I am sure he doesN#t mind playing with you from time to time. You just have to pay him in rare materials."  
Muqiu sighed. As if he would do that. He had already helped One Autumn Leaf to get some rare materials. Therefore he already had done a good deed for today, thus there was no need to do another one.

Now that he couldn't be as active in the online games as before, since the summer break was over – at least the break from training – it might be the best to have Lord Grim in his friend list, so he could see whether the other one was online or not. He didn't want to waste his time with searching for Lord Grim, although the latter one wasn't even there. However, before he could send the request, he received one from Lord Grim. Somehow both Lord Grim and One Autumn Leaf seemed to know what he wanted to do and preempted him. Or he was simply too slow? Was that possible?  
"You should accept his request. It will be easier to rob him in, when you're friends", Mucheng suggested with a smile.  
So she was behind all this? Had she told Lord Grim, who had attacked him and his friends and what the other side's intention was?  
"Stop rushing me or else I might get a heart attack", Muqiu joked and accepted the request send by Lord Grim.  
The other side also immediately send him a message, asking whether Muqiu was up for a dungeon run. Very direct. Different from One Autumn Lead, who only had asked Muqiu two times, whether he was up to either hunt a boss or clear a dungeon. The rest of their conversation had never been anything to deep or important, just small talk. Small talk that made Muqiu wonder, what the other side was up to.  
Muqiu decided to take the opportunity to get to know Lord Grim better and turned back. Inside the dungeon he could also take a look at the other players and see how their teamwork was – not that he hadn't had a more or less clear picture of them thanks to watching Mucheng playing, but better safe than sorry.  
As soon as the returned to Lord Grim and his group the Brawler came up to him and started talking. He took a look at the avatar's name. Steamed Bun Invasion. What had Mucheng said? "Let's hope we never have to deal with Huang Shaotian and Steamed Bun together" or something along that line? Hopefully, he really never had to deal with both of them. Fortunately, Steamed Bun's talking got less inside the dungeon, while Lord Grim's talking increased. Moreover, Muqiu realized that both Steamed Bun Invasion and Soft Mist got the most orders – some were even quite detailed – while One Inch Ash barely got any command. The latter one knew what he had to do without any instructions most of the time. Mucheng had left the group for this run, so her brother could fill in. Outside of the game she was now sitting next to him and watched him observing her friends. She didn't utter a single word. There was no reason to.  
The dungeon run took longer than Muqiu had expected. Lord Grim had talked almost none stop giving out instructions. Thinking about it, he hadn't been interested in setting a record, but rather to improve the teamwork of his little group. Soft Mist and Steamed Bun still made a lot of beginner mistakes, but one could even see throughout the dungeon that those become less and less. Furthermore, Muqiu realized that Lord Grim had given him almost no instructions. It hadn't bothered him and came to his mind inside the dungeon, because Muqiu was used to not receiving instructions. Usually, it was him who gave the orders. Probably, Lord Grim knew that he wasn't new to the game and had a good understanding of his surroundings. One other hand, when the other side knew that Mucheng was a pro player, they probably assumed that her brother was one too. Did the other side know? What had Mucheng told the other one about herself or him?

This dungeon run was the start of a very hard time for Muqiu and his patience. His goal was still to rob Lord Grim in, but his time was limited to the period between the end of the training and bed time – also had to make sure not to bother himself too much with the in-game affairs. Being too occupied with the game could cause his performance to drop, because he was distracted – this would be too unprofessional! However, during the time he was able to interact with Lord Grim, he tried to get as many information as possible out of the other one. Unfortunately, the other side was an expert in avoiding answering, changing the topic smoothly or answering so vaguely that the answer was worthless. The registration period for the Challenger League had begun. From time to time Muqiu would check the forums to see, if someone reported a team with an unspecialized character in it. Theoretically he could look through all the teams that had already registered, but this would take too much time and in the end new teams would register over and over again, so he had to go through all of them again. Many teams had similar or even identical names, thus it was hard to know just by the name of it, at which team he had already looked. Furthermore the information on the players of the teams were also minimal. Should he ask Mucheng, if she knew anything? When he had asked Lord Grim, the latter one had denied taking part in the Challenger League, while sounding somewhat unsure. Maybe Lord Grim had not yet decided whether to take part or not? Maybe he wanted to do so, but lacked a team for it? As far as Muqiu knew, Lord Grim's group consisted of five people. However, Mucheng could not and would not participate in the Challenger League, so it the reduced the group to four. There was no healer and last but not least, four people were not enough players for the competition.  
Besides the other one's ability in avoiding answering, Muqiu also found an interesting habit of Lord Grim: Whenever the clock neared nine p.m. Lord Grim would logout, just to log in again a minute later. Muqiu assumed that the other side was switching places. Surprisingly, when Muqiu asked, why Lord Grim logged out, just to log in a minute later, he actually received a useful answer. Yes, Lord Grim indeed switched places. And when asked why he did so, he answered, because of his work as internet café manager. This was probably the most useful and most personal information Muqiu had received from Lord Grim in all those weeks he run after the latter one. If China were a small country and with barely any internet cafés, Muqiu would probably search through all of them, but since China wasn't a small country and had too many internet cafés, he did not. Maybe he could get the other one to tell him in which city he lived or the name of the internet café?  
Muqiu's interaction with One Autumn Leaf become less and less, since he only had one computer in his bedroom, thus could only log into one account at a time. On the other side, his interaction with Han Wenqing, the creator and current owner of Desert Dust, increased. Those two knew each other for about ten years by now. It started with them as normal players in the first server and continued throughout their time in the Alliance as opponents. Han Wenqing was the God of team Tyranny, while Muqiu was Excellent Era's God.  
Differently than Muqiu, Wenqing could remember One Autumn Leaf right away. How could he forget the person he was chasing after in the first server for so long, the person he had so many battle with that he couldn't even count them, the person that annoyed him to no end and the person that suddenly left without a word, without a trace? Apparently, Muqiu's Autumn Tree and One Autumn Leaf were the most terrifying and most annoying duo Wenqing had ever to deal with. However, he had been quite disappointed, when only Muqiu joint a pro team. Nowadays Han Wenqing did not care anymore, whether One Autumn Leaf was back or not or if he would join a pro team or not. The rivalry between them wasn't gone, but it wasn't as strong as before. Wenqing somewhat looked down on One Autumn Leaf for disappearing. To him it looked like the other one had been afraid of competing against other great players, afraid of losing. Still Muqiu had the feeling that Wenqing was edgy to fight against One Autumn Leaf once more, just to find out whether the other one was still as good as back then. Yet, this was just a feeling, an assumption, since they only communicated through writing, Muqiu could neither see the expression nor hear underlined tones in Wenqing's voice, which could have been possible, if they had talked with each other. "One Autumn Leaf was back in the Heavenly Domain, so go and find him there, challenge him to a duel, whenever you have some time and energy to spare", this was all Muqiu could tell Wenqing. Maybe the other side followed his suggestion.  
Meanwhile Muqiu had his own challenge with Lord Grim, who was still busy bullying the guilds. Not that it was entirely his fault, since the different guild leaders often sought Lord Grim out for help or simply accepted the antics of the other one. It was understandable to a certain extent, since they had to get the needed materials for the clubs, had to represent the club in the game, which was done through dungeon records and first kills, and they had their long term rivalry going on. Lord Grim just used those point against them and there was nothing they could do to stop him. Logically, they could stop fighting each other and work together, but due to their long history of betraying each other, scheming and competing with each other, such a thing could not be accomplished overnight. It would need more years and more Lord Grims to achieve that. Somehow this was quite sad. How did the guild leaders deal with this for all this time? Well, whatever, this was not Muqiu's problem. His problem right now was to get Lord Grim to do what he wanted – join Excellent Era! As soon as the new season started Muqiu would again have less time for the game. Could they really wait another year for Lord Grim? One year was a lot! Therefore, he decided to be more direct with his intentions. Until now he had either only dropped hints or said them in a joking manner.  
"You should join Excellent Era", Muqiu said, while he and Lord Grim cleared a dungeon together.  
By now Lord Grim knew, who Muqiu was, but had never said anything about it.  
"Why should I?", Lord Grim responded.  
"Because you're a very skilled player and it would be a waste, if you stayed in the game. Isn't it boring for you? What appears to be a challenge for others, is none for you. Also going pro with an unspecialized never happened before. Not only fighting against other talented player would be a challenge, but doing so with an unspecialized even more so."  
"Um… And why should I join Excellent Era? I can also join… team Tyranny."  
Of course he had to use their rival team as example.  
"You can join which team you want and which team is willing to take you. Considering how much commotion you caused and how the guild still try to get your favor, I think your chances are quite good with all the teams."  
Before Lord Grim could response, Muqiu added: "Your friends can also come. Although our team already has enough players, they can join the trainings camp or be reserve players. They are talented, but they still lacking experience, so it will be better to either let them be reserve players or have them in the trainings camp."  
"You should discuss such matter with them. I cannot make any decisions for them. But I heard Soft Mist already declined to become a pro player."  
"Going to trainings camp is not the same as becoming a pro player. And maybe she changes her mind midway. Anyhow, what about you?"  
Muqiu and Lord Grim left the dungeon. Both of them had used up their dungeon entries for this one.  
"I will leave for now. Work is starting soon."  
"Wait! It's not nine o'clock yet. You still have some time left. Don't run away!"  
He was sure, as soon as Lord Grim logged off and in again, the other one would act as if their current conversation had never happened and he had to start all over again. Also it was easier to avoid conversation when being at work. Not that Lord Grim's player had ever pulled something pathetic and mean like this, but there still was this kind of leeway.  
"Huh, you know when my shift starts? Are you stalking me or something? Don't tell me you're even lurking out your window to observe me, while I peacefully smoke my cigarette… That's creepy."  
"No, I do not stalk you!"  
Everyone who paid a little bit of attention to his surrounding would sooner or later realize Lord Grim's log in and out habit.  
"Then that's good. Now I will take my leave. See you later."  
And with this Lord Grim logged out. Muqiu stayed and waited, while starring at his chat with the other side. Now he could partly understand, why the guilds were so done with Lord Grim. That guy was a case for himself. However, in a strange way Muqiu like the other one. He could not pinpoint what it was, but somehow the other one had something playful and joyful. Lord Grim seemed quite serious about Glory, but also never forgot to have fun, never forgot that Glory was a game and in a game one would lose and win. Also that shape shifting weapon was very interesting and nothing someone, who causally played would be able to make.

While waiting, Muqiu reread the chat with Lord Grim over and over again, because he had nothing better to do. "Why are you so against joining a pro team?", he wanted to ask, but had never done so. Maybe this was the right time to do so? They were talking about this matte anyway, so it wouldn't be strange to ask such a question. And it was a very legitimate one. Many players out there that would do anything for becoming a pro player, become a part of a professional team – even when it was just small and weak team – and here was Lord Grim, who didn't seem to give a damn about it. Or was this just ploy? It must be! The very second Muqiu started to type down his question, he froze.  
"Don't tell me you're even lurking out your window to observe me."  
"You're even lurking out your window to observe me."  
"You're even lurking out your window …"  
"… to observe me."  
Muqiu jumped out of his chair and run to his window. Could he see Lord Grim from his window? Was that guy that near? Was he that near the whole damn time?  
There was a small internet café on the other side of the street, only a few steps away from Excellent Era's club building. From his window Muqiu could only see a tiny bit of the Internet café, just a bit of this red lighted character of the internet café's name. Without thinking Muqiu opened his window to stick his head out. Maybe he could see more that way. Unfortunately, this wasn't the case. He could see some people standing in front of the Internet café, some walking by, but there was nothing remarkable about them, which reminded him that his doing was useless. He didn't know how Lord Grim's player looked like in the first place. So even when he could see the people on the other side of the street, he wouldn't be able to tell, who was Lord Grim and who wasn't. However, what he knew was that Lord Grim's player worked at an Internet café, that his shift started at nine o'clock and that he could theoretically see the other one from his window. Consequently, the other one must work at this little Internet café across the street!  
Upon his realization Muqiu felt the joy of a young child at its birthday, getting all its wishes fulfilled. It was a miracle that he didn't forget to log out of Glory and disguise himself, when he left his room and made his way downstairs.  
Outside Muqiu was welcomed by a warm breeze – somehow it was warmer outside than inside. One could even say it was cold inside compared to outside. Mindlessly he run down the street and crossed it, when no car was near. Getting hit by a car was not Muqiu's goal – to the contrary it would go against his goal! Safely reaching the other side of the street Muqiu more or less stormed into the Internet café – the young lady at the reception didn't seem to care though – maybe she was already used to people like him? People that stormed the Internet café all wrapped up in clothes. Questionable. Probably she was just too busy with something else to pay attention to him and how he entered. When he reached the front desk she looked up from her computer and greeted him with a friendly smile, asking him if he wanted a computer and internet. Under normal circumstances this kind of question would be useless, since this was an Internet café and people, who would enter it where here for the computer and internet. It was a question out of courtesy. In Muqiu's case this question wasn't wrong. Why was he here? Another realization hit him. He hadn't had Lord Grim's player's real name. He was here to search for the latter one, but neither knew the other one's name nor how he looked like. It would have been better to wait until nine or shortly after, because then Lord Grim's player would probably sit where the young woman was sitting right now. If he told her that he was search for Lord Grim, she would probably think he wasn't right in his mind anymore. Also she wouldn't be able to help, since she surely didn't know, who of her colleagues played Glory and used the name Lord Grim. And if she knew, would she tell him?  
"Um… actually I am searching for one of your colleagues. His shift starts at nine every day", he replayed to her previous question.  
His gaze shifted to the clock on the right side of the room. It was almost nine o'clock. With an unsure look the young woman also looked at the clock. Should she warn her colleague? But it was already too late for his. Someone had made his way behind the reception. When said person came closer to the computer at the front desk, the woman turned to him, while pointing at Muqiu: "Brother Ye, this man is searching for you."  
Brother Ye looked at Muqiu, who starred back. Silence.  
Silently Muqiu scanned the man in front of him. Beautiful hands – the right one holding an account card –, worn off jacket, pale face, a "more dead than alive" look. He had seen that before. He had seen the other man before.  
"You?", Muqiu cried out in surprise.  
This person was supposed to be Lord Grim?  
"Me?"


End file.
